Shortly before that news about more diverse results in organic search came out, Google was granted a patent in May which told us about how they might enforce category diversity in showing different points of interest in local search results, This post is about that effort to make local search results more diverse.

More Diversity At Google in 2013, in Past Search Results

So this isn’t the first time we have heard about efforts from Google in trying to give us more diverse results, and they came out with a patent around that time to provide more diverse results as well.

I remember getting a phone call around 6 years ago from a co-worker who asked me why a client’s high ranking organic result might disappear from search results. I asked for the query and the client’s name and ran the search. The top-ranking result was a local result for the client. I told my co-worker that I was seeing that, and she told me that our client also used to have an organic result showing for that query, and a local result that wasn’t quite as high. It appeared that the organic result had been removed, and the local result had been boosted.

Coincidentally, I had written the following blog post the day before: How Google May Create Diverse Search Results by Merging Local and Web Search Results. I told my co-worker about the patent I had written about the day before, and sent her a link to that blog post. We were able to explain to our client what appears to have happened to their organic result for that query, that it looks like Google’s desire to have more diverse search results cause their page ranking organically was “merged” with the local result.

Category Diversity in a Patent Granted in 2019

I hadn’t seen anything quite like that merger between organic results and a local result happen again after that. It is impossible to tell if Google has been using that kind of merging since then. But that patent was all about providing more diverse search results to searchers. So when I see a patent, like this new one that tells us it exists to provide more diverse search results, I find myself wondering what, if anything could have been removed to make search results more diverse. If someone searches for “things to do in Carlsbad, California,” and they are provided with a list of restaurants to eat at, that would be disappointing, because while there are some nice restaurants here, there are plenty of other things to do.

By expanding to a category diversity from a diversity-based upon pages from the same domain, Google is giving us more diverse search results.

This new patent tells us about this category diversity in the following way:

When a searcher asks for points of interest information at a certain location, the local search system may generate a collection of candidate POIs and receives information relating to each candidate POI’s respective category and a score and rank within the category for each, and, for categories a searcher may select, promotes or demotes the score of each ranked candidate POI within its respective category through a scaling process.

It really is impossible to tell if Google has already implemented this patent which was granted in May. I tried some searches at different places to see if they showed diverse results for those places, and was given diversity in what I was being shown:

When I search for [points of interest Raleigh, NC], I get results that start out with a carousel of top things to do in Raleigh:

When I search for ][points of interest Carlsbad, Ca], I get results that start with a carousel of top things to do in Carlsbad:

I wasn’t surprised to see carousels for those particular queries, and I tried a few more, worded a little differently, which didn’t trigger carousels. The patent doesn’t mention carousels, though. But those results do show some category diversity.

The patent does provide a lot of details on how Google might demote some listings that are in categories that are over-represented, and promote some listings that are associated with categories that are under-represented.

The summary of the patent gives us the process behind it in a nutshell, telling us that the method behind it, includes receiving a request to:

Identify points of interest (POIs),
Obtaining data identifying

Candidate points of interest (POIs) that satisfy the request

A respective category associated with each candidate POI

A non-scaled score associated with each candidate POI, ranking, for each of one or more of the categories, the candidate POIs associated with the category, based on the respective non-scaled scores, scaling, for each of the one or more categories, the non-scaled scores of the ranked candidate POIs associated with the category, ranking the candidate POIs using the scaled scores, for the candidate POIs that are associated with the one or more categories, and the non-scaled scores, for the candidate POIs that are not associated with the one or more categories, and providing data that identifies two or more of the candidate POIs, as ranked according to the scaled scores and the non-scaled scores

It goes on to provide much more depth about how category diversity might be achieved. And reading through it, it makes sense, that in an area where you may have a variety of 30-50 places that someone might want to visit, and five of those are Italian Restaurants, and the rest include other kinds of restaurants, museums, parks, beaches, theatres, stores, playgrounds, stadiums, nightclubs. You wouldn’t want to just tell a potential visitor to that location that there are five Italian Restaurants there and nothing about the diversity of other kinds of places.

Here is a little richer description of how Google may go about enforcing category diversity in response to requests for information about points of interest at different locations:

Selecting, as the one or more categories, one or more categories that are each associated with more than a predetermined number of candidate POIs the predetermined number is two

The method includes selecting, as the one or more categories, one or more categories that are each associated with one or more candidate POI

Scaling, for each of the one or more categories that are associated with only one candidate POI, the non-scaled score of the ranked candidate POI associated with the category comprises multiplying the non-scaled score of the ranked candidate POI associated with the category by a factor of one

Scaling the non-scaled scores of the ranked, candidate POIs includes increasing the respective non-scaled scores of the top n ranked candidate POIs

Scaling the non-scaled scores of the ranked, candidate POIs includes leaving unchanged the non-scaled scores of one or more of the top n ranked candidate POIs

Scaling the non-scaled scores of the ranked, candidate POIs includes decreasing the non-scaled scores of one or more of the top n ranked candidate POIs

Dynamically determining a scaling factor to use to scale one or more non-scaled scores of the ranked, candidate POIs of a particular category based on a non-scaled score associated with a top ranked candidate POI of a different category; and/or the method includes dynamically determining a scaling factor to use to scale one or more non-scaled scores of the ranked, candidate POIs of a particular category based on a quantity of the candidate POIs of the particular category identified in the data.

That is a fairly complex approach to achieve diversity of results, but it seems to be one that will provide results that are truly diverse.

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for enforcing the category diversity or sub-category diversity of POIs that are identified in response to a local search. According to one implementation, a method includes receiving a request to identify points of interest (POIs), obtaining data identifying (i) candidate points of interest (POIs) that satisfy the request, (ii) a respective category associated with each candidate POI, and (iii) a non-scaled score associated with each candidate POI, and ranking, for each of one or more of the categories, the candidate POIs associated with the category, based on the respective non-scaled scores. The method also includes scaling, for each of the one or more categories, the non-scaled scores of the ranked candidate POIs associated with the category, ranking the candidate POIs using the scaled scores, for the candidate POIs that are associated with the one or more categories, and the non-scaled scores, for the candidate POIs that are not associated with the one or more categories, and providing data that identifies two or more of the candidate POIs, as ranked according to the scaled scores and the non-scaled scores.

Takeaways

If I didn’t mention this patent, you may not have noticed a need for it. If it didn’t exist, and every time someone searched for something like [things to do in Carlsbad], and the same 5 Italian Restaurants showed up as things to do in town, you would notice that there isn’t much diversity.

I do find myself wondering what isn’t being included in These local results that are enforcing category diversity, but I do like seeing that diversity.

And if I want to see all of the local Italian Restaurants in the area, I can try another search for just for [Italian Restaurant].

14 thoughts on “How Google Enforces Category Diversity for Some Local Search Results”

Hey Bill, thank you for sharing this – caring indeed! I’ve googled the best places to visit in my city – and boom – a carousel appeared. Never gave it enough attention in the past. Speaking of restaurants, you are absolutely right – constantly getting them in your search results above everything else would’ve been a disaster! Nice to know that Googles cares about its users after all!

Hi Bill,
Great article. In the past few days I’ve noticed a SERP that has always been 10 domains and 100% commercial results (as in I’m looking for a product category to buy a product) to sometimes now displaying 2 results from the same domain, the original category page (pos 2) and one non-category page (pos 3). Do you think this is a result of the latest Diversity inforcement changes?

Thanks. Great post and breakdown, as always. I’ve noticed this happening a lot more frequently across our vertical. Most noticeably between localised websites vs national ones. Think I’ve got a better understanding now.

Thank you for sharing that observation. It’s difficult to tell when categories may be purposefully diverse, but it can be much easier to tell when they aren’t. Appreciate the confirmation that you are seeing diversity among categories like this.

I’m curious to understand how much of the “diversity” is ruled by Google and how much, if any, is in the control of the user. If I’m always looking for places to eat near me, and keep choosing the same type (such as Italian), is there an opening anywhere for Google to recommend trying a different cuisine, or going beyond a mile limit or showing a special deal on a new organic cafe? Can it tell the difference between a user who is routine oriented and not up for change, vs someone who wants to explore new things?

Good to see you. I think the query you decide to use will trigger what you might end up seeing – there aren’t any selectors or checkboxes, but I’m still exploring all of the places to eat at in Southern California near my home, and there is an incredible amount of Mexican and Seafood places in the area. I’ve been heading into the next town over, because there are a lot of places on Coastal Highway 101 in Encinitas, which has a great small town feel to it. But I just tried these searches, and got a wide variety of places to try: [places to eat Carlsbad] [places to dine Carslbad] [restaurants Carlsbad] Nothing was repeated, and there were some Mexican and Seafood places listed, but the results also included Spanish Food, California Cuisine and at least one Brew Pub.

I didn’t see anything that allowed you to indicate that you wanted to see the same types of places, or that you wanted to try something new.

I’m also getting notifications from Google Maps about places they are recommending that I might like because they are similar to places I reviewed. If you open the mobile version of Google Maps, they show you an “Explore nearby” feature, and you can mark places that you find interesting looking as places that you might like to try. Then if you get near those places, Google will send you a notification that they are close – I have used that in the past, and found some really good places that I would have missed otherwise.

SEO by the Sea focuses upon SEO as the search engines tell us about it, from sources such as patents and white papers from the search engines. This information about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is tempered by years of experience from the author of the site, who has been doing SEO since the days when search engines started appearing on the Web.

Follow Bill Slawski at:

To find out about internet marketing, consulting and SEO services, for your site or business contact
Bill Slawski at:

SEO by the SeaCarlsbad, Ca92009

Tel: 1 (442) 244-0941
M-F, 9am – 5pm (pst)

I am the Director of SEO Research at Go Fish Digital. Contact us at Go Fish Digital:

(703) 596-1353 (9:00am-5:00pm est.)

Follow us at:

Is your site Seaworthy?

Look into getting an SEO Site Audit. SEO can help deliver more qualified traffic to your website.